‘Step-motherly treatment for doubles players’
New Delhi: Unhappy with the step-motherly treatment meted out to doubles in the country, ace shuttler Ashwini Ponnappa said Wednesday that there is no motivation for the youngsters to choose a career in the format.
“India is a country which does not focus on doubles. Singles players are doing really well but in doubles it’s different, the encouragement is different,” said Ponnappa, who had won a bronze at 2011 World Championships along with Jwala Gutta in women’s doubles.
“You are working against the system where even if you do really well your performance is not highlighted, you don’t get as many sponsors as singles players do and if that’s the case what will be the motivation for youngsters to pick up doubles?” Ponnappa pointed out.
Ponnappa along with some other doubles players had earlier criticised the Badminton Association of India (BAI) for rewarding the junior nationals singles title winners with cars while neglecting the doubles winners.
“In India singles is where the limelight is, and doubles is like another event, your last resort – if things don’t work out in singles you move to doubles,” Ponnappa informed.
“When you look at the Chinese, Koreans or the Japanese, they have a minimum of five players who are doing well at the international level in doubles. It is not that doubles is their last resort, in fact it is their first choice,” added the 2010 CWG gold medal winner in women’s doubles.
Ponnappa also lamented the fact that only the feats of the singles players are talked about in India while the achievements in doubles is duly forgotten.
“People still talk about Prakash Padukone and Pullela Gopichand’s feats in singles which happened long time ago. But how many talk about Jwala and Valiyaveetil Diju who were the first mixed doubles pair to have played the final of Super Series,” she asked.
